Santiago Island
Today we came back to the central part of the archipelago to visit Santiago Island. This place has been a much visited area in different parts of the history of the Galapagos: buccaneers, pirates and whalers stopped by, and later in history there was even a salt mine business here. Charles Darwin himself spent nine days exploring this island too.
Today we started early with a hike on Espumilla Beach. This place has a beautiful Palo Santo forest, home of several land birds. At our landing site we were welcomed by four Galapagos hawks and several green Pacific sea turtles that came back from nesting. During the hike we spotted several species of finches, flycatchers and mockingbirds that sang their songs for us.
We explored the shores of Buccaneer’s Cove either from our Zodiacs or our kayaks and then we came back ready for snorkeling.
In the afternoon we were able to enjoy a black beach where the snorkeling was another highlight, or walk along the shore line of Puerto Egas. On the hike as the tide was low we found several shore birds along the tide pools: great blue herons and great egrets, plovers and sandpipers. Finally at the grottos we found some fur seals resting. Later we came back onboard for a well-deserved cocktail. We saw all that Santiago could offer us today, on another great expedition.
